>what skills are useful in resisting manipulation
You don’t get as many results for this one, but the second one seems promising. It’s some kind of “psychology” site.
“…being taken advantage of is a common thing in our society, but it is is possible to avoid with skill development. Knowing what the steps that common manipulators use is the key to avoiding being manipulated yourself.
Step 1) Manipulators will look for ways to make you feel insecure about your life, and make you feel like you are missing something, or target areas that you have worries and doubts about.
Step 2) Manipulators will use these insecurities to provoke an emotional reaction of some kind- the stronger, the better. This reaction may override your common sense, and make you more susceptible to their manipulation.
Step 3) Manipulators use your emotional state to suggest that doing what they would like you to do would be beneficial to not only you, but potentially a larger group- it could be your school, your workplace, your friends and/or family…or even a group they themself belong to.
Step 4) Manipulators will try to erase your fear and doubt about an action with reassurance, and potentially make things more appealing through rewards either through themself or your own actions.
These are not the only ways that manipulators operate, and knowing them does not make you completely immune to manipulation- but knowledge is power, and knowing at least common techniques behind manipulators’ actions will help you to avoid trouble.”
…these don’t make you feel very good about your recent talk with Max.